CHAPTER I.

It was in the year of our Lord 1322, according to the Japanese calendar the fourth year of the reign of Go Dai Go Tenno, the ninety-fifth descendant of Jimmu Tenno, and nineteen hundred and eighty-two years from the time when the latter had assumed the title of the “First Emperor of Japan.”

FARM LABORER.

For the first time in its history a general peace, lasting for more than a century, reigned over the land. Guerilla and border warfare, it is true, was still carried on, in a desultory manner, in different parts of the empire; feuds between the daimio of neighboring provinces were no rarities; and thekataki-uchi, the Japanese vendetta, still caused many bloody tragedies to be enacted, and year after year claimed its thousands of victims. All such disturbances, however, originating in private jealousy and personal enmity, had during this period been merely local, without expanding sufficiently to assume a national character, as in former centuries, when one half of the fighting population was constantly at war with the other. During a hundred and two years no organized revolt against the authority of the Shôgun, or rather against the Ilōjō family, who were the real rulers, had occurred. The administration of the latter, both civil and military, was, it is true, excellent in most regards,—a fact which not even their enemies couldgainsay. The success with which they had repelled the invasion of the Tartar force sent by Kublai Khan, with its countless ships and its tens of thousands of warriors, showed them to be brave and skilled in war, while the general prosperity of the empire gave ample evidence both of their knowledge of the country’s needs and of their ability to enforce those measures by which the arts of peace are made to flourish. Farmers tilled their lands free from the harrowing care which beset their forefathers as to whether they would be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, or whether roving bands would seize the garnered harvest and even force the young and strong to become unwilling recruits among the henchmen and servants attending the feudal chiefs. The advance in commerce, art,and more especially in learning and the polite accomplishments, had been extraordinary, and their regenerating influence had gradually made itself felt in all parts of the empire. Plenty and apparent security reigned everywhere; and yet it was felt and known by those who cared to think and who took notice of passing events, that the end of this period of tranquillity was inevitable, and moreover even now near at hand. Every coming day might see the smouldering embers of discontent, hitherto concealed, blaze forth into a fierce and destructive civil war.

WOMAN SOWING RICE.

One of the surest signs of the trouble impending was the increased military activity displayed at the court of every daimio. The coming conflict cast its shadow before, not in boisterous speech or loud-mouthed denunciation, but in thetraining of body and limb to be duly prepared for action requiring physical strength and endurance. Horses were made to learn their paces, swords and lances were sharpened, buckler and shield were burnished, and every armorer’s workshop echoed the sounds of toil from early morning until late at night.

Kuwana, the capital of the province of Ise, could at this period boast of one of the gayest and yet most martial courts in the land. The character of the reigning Duke, who had ruled for more than thirty-six years, was such that although courage, daring, and manly accomplishments could well look for their due meed of reward at his hands, deeds of unjustifiable violence and ill-will found no opportunity to interfere with or check the progress and prosperity of the land.

He was now fifty-five years old, and had become stout and fleshy and—for he loved the wine-cup no less than the sword—gouty as well, and he was frequently obliged to be carried to his pavilion on the field to witness sports in which, not so very long before, he used to participate and shine in a way that few could equal. Traces of his former prowess were still evident in his face and bearing, despite his corpulence and bodily helplessness. There was about him a self-possession, or rather a self-assertion, of manner which appertains only to those who have learned to maintain themselves and their rights in positions of importance and difficulty; and to do this in those times required physical strength as well as qualities of the mind which go to make up leaders of men. His bright, fierce eye followed closely and with evident enjoyment every motion of those among the actors who showed more than ordinary skill;and when any unusually daring feat was performed, his hands and arms worked convulsively, and he swayed himself to and fro as if to assist with his body where only his eyes could take part.

Ono ga Sawa, as the Duke was called, was feared and held in awe by his neighbors, who in the desultory border warfare in which they had sometimes been engaged, had found that his dare-devil courage was equalled by his astuteness, his energy, and his extraordinary tenacity. By the people of his province, and more especially by his retainers, to whom he was a kind and considerate master, he was honored and respected. He loved boldness and valor, and even in speech he encouraged frankness and openness to a degree rare with those in his position. Of a jovial and good-natured disposition withal, he ever approved of mirth and frolic, and often at the dinner-table bandied jokes with his attendants, and would even bear from those he liked a return in kind.

MYTHOLOGICAL GODS OF JAPAN.

There was only one point upon which it would have been injudicious to speak with freedom in his presence. The old lord had a great veneration for family and gentle birth, for blue blood and for the superiority to which the possession of a long line of ancestors could justly lay claim. He was fond of displaying his genealogical tree, showing his descent from Nakatomi no Kamatari, the celebrated minister of Tenchi Tenno in the seventh century, who himself was a descendant of the royal house of Fujiwara. When excited by wine he did not stop there, but would count back to Jimmu Tenno, the first Emperor of Japan, two thousand years ago; and he was even known at such times to refer to Isanami no Mikotoand Isanagi no Mikoto, the primeval mythological gods of the country, in a way which seemed to show plainly that he considered himself as standing in some sort of relationship with them. Now there was not a scullion in the kitchen, nor a sandal-bearer in the courtyard, who did not indulge in jokes at this propensity; for they all knew that the old gentleman’s grandfather was a common peasant, who in the wars which followed the accession of the Minamoto family to the Shôgunate, when he was pressed as a soldier, had by personal bravery and native force of character raised himself to the position of a military general. His son, the father of the present lord, had in his early youth been apprentice to a dyer, and from thence had been called to the camp of his parent when the latter began to acquire military glory. But the bravest of the brave military retainers atthe court would sooner have faced unarmed a wild boar than breathe a word of doubt or even show a look of incredulity when, as so often happened, the old genealogical tree was taken down and explained to them. Etiquette at that time was not what it became much later,—an element of such importance in the education of everysamuraias to curb temporarily the fiercest temper and force the most headstrong passions to subordinate themselves to time and place. The long reign of peace had its softening influence; yet, although threatening talk and angry looks were not as likely as before to lead to immediate violence, they were strangers neither at the festive board nor in the council-hall. An utter disregard, however, for all rules of society as they existed even then, and a reckless fashion of indulging his passions when aroused, made Ono ga Sawa a man to be carefully humored by his attendants.

An incident which had happened ten years previously was still fresh in the memory of every one. An embassy had arrived from the province of Sendai to arrange a marriage between the son of the lord of that province and a daughter of Ono ga Sawa. All the preliminaries had been concluded, and a grand festival and banquet were being given in honor of the occasion. Toward the end of the carouse, when wine had loosened tongues and conversation had become general, the chief ambassador, perhaps in ignorance or inadvertence, but more probably from a desire to check the feeling of pride with which he had so often been received, essayed a joke about the silk which faced the dress of his host. “You must be a good judge of dyeing, and perhaps have a specialreceipt handed down to you, to give that ribbon such a rich, deep purple color,” he began; but if he had intended to say more, the general silence which followed this remark caused him to refrain. The sudden cessation of all mirth and conversation struck those present as with a chill, and the laughing faces of a moment before now showed only anxious looks furtively directed toward their lord.

Ono ga Sawa’s face, though flushed with wine, became overspread with a deadly pallor. The silence of his followers not only prevented him from overlooking a remark which in cooler moments he might perhaps have disregarded, but gave it undue prominence. Before the assembled guests had twice drawn breath he had unsheathed his small sword and aimed a desperate blow at the ambassador. The excess of his fury, rather than a natural shrinking away on the part of his intended victim, caused the weapon to miscarry, only slightly grazing the other’s skin and drawing a few drops of blood; but this was sufficient to enable him to regain his self-control. Those composing the ambassador’s suite had risen with muttered threats and placed themselves behind their chief; while the Kuwana men, who formed the large majority, also rose and surrounded their lord. The latter, however, now perfectly calm, with one glance caused his retainers to resume their stations. Slowly replacing his sword, to show he meant no further violence, but only half sheathing it, and keeping it firmly grasped, he said: “The only kind of dyeing I understand is dyeing with blood; those spots upon your doublet now show the same color as my ribbon,—the color of blood, the color I love to see whenever honor demands it.”

THE DUKE’S ATTACK ON THE AMBASSADOR.

In saying this, his meaning was not to be misunderstood. He showed himself ready to stand by the consequences of his act; yet there was a certain half-conciliatory tone and manner about him of which the other thought best to avail himself. He knew that if the failure of the important mission with which he was intrusted could be attributed to his own lack of discretion—to which in this instance it might be ascribed, although the provocation he had given was certainly a slight one—it would end in his own disgrace with his lord. So, quickly collecting himself, with a laugh as natural as he could simulate, he replied: “You have certainly given us a good practical illustration of what you call your style of dyeing, and if you intended it as a lesson, I will accept it as such from you; although there are very few lords in this kingdom for whom it would be safe or advisable to attempt a similar course of teaching with me.”

STREET BOARD FOR GOVERNMENT EDICTS.

Physical courage in those days was a common virtue, and that of the envoy was too well known to be doubted; his course in ignoring the rash act prompted by the other’s ungovernable temper only raised him in the opinion of every one present, including Ono ga Sawa himself. It was probably the only period in the history of Japan when such an occurrence could have taken place without entailing more serious consequences. During the long civil wars which were soon to follow, peaceful solutions of any difficulty were again out of the question; and after that time the observance of etiquette was made so imperative that such a breach of it as had been here committed by Ono ga Sawa would have demanded redress by law, and would have subjected its perpetrator to severepunishment by the court of the Shôgun. On the other hand, up to a hundred years previous, when fighting was the rule all over the land to the exclusion of everything else, such a course as had been here taken by the ambassador would certainly not have been appreciated; it would have been utterly opposed to the spirit of an age which acknowledged no other honorable means of redress than an appeal to arms, and which did not permit any qualification asto time and place, but demanded instant and unhesitating action, even if self-destruction was the certain result.

EMPEROR OF JAPAN.

But the last hundred years had wrought a considerable change. Nominally the profession of arms was still the only one a gentleman could engage in; but literature, art, and the polite accomplishments had begun to claim a fair share of attention. The strong government of the Hōjō at Kamakura had improved laws and regulations and caused them to be respected, thus imbuing the rising generation with a sense of order and obedience to which their forefathers had been strangers. It was a salutary discipline, which naturally found its counterpart in a certain self-restraint introduced into the social relations of life, into the intercourse between man and man. Everysamuraiwas still ready and eager to serve actively as a soldier; but in the absence of such opportunities he tried to show his aptitude for other pursuits. Many descendants of the royal house of Fujiwara more especially distinguished themselves in civil employment.

The centre of the whole movement—from whence, indeed, it derived its principal support—was the Mikado’s court at Kiyoto. Soon after the close of the great struggle which saw the Minamoto family firmly established as Shôguns, the songs of the high priest Tiun, son of the Kuwambaku Tadamichi, first officer in the above court, had taken a powerful hold on the public mind. As early as the year 1232 the issuing and editing of a full and complete edition of all the valuable lyric and heroic poetry then extant had been intrusted to Fujiwara no Sada by the Mikado himself. In the succeeding reign the brother of the governing Emperor, the high priest Yen ManIn,—a man equally noted for erudition, for courtly manners, and for the charm of his conversation, who, although ordained for the church, exercised, by his talent for government, supreme influence at the court,—greatly quickened the advancement of learning, of letters, and of the polite accomplishments.

By the middle of the century the intellectual current had filtered into and permeated the purely military court at Kamakura, where the reigning Shôgun had called upon Kiyowara, a celebrated sage, to review and explain to him the well-known Chinese workTei Wan(or “Guide for the Conduct of Rulers and Sovereigns”), and Tokiyori, lord of Sagami, his first minister,—a man of the type of Yen Man In, who by mere force of character and capacity was the virtual ruler of the Shôgun’s court, as much as the other was at the imperial court,—himself copied and commented upon the workTei Kuwan Sei Yo(“Study of the Principles of Politics”), publishing it in his own name. In the beginning of the fourteenth century the effects of this regeneration had made themselves felt more or less in every part of Japan, and although military prowess was held in as high esteem as ever, its value was greatly enhanced if added to it was some degree of polite learning, dignity, and courtliness of manner. Ono ga Sawa himself attached great value to these latter qualities, and the action of the lord of Sendai’s ambassador in ignoring and adroitly turning into a sort of joke what would certainly not have tended to the other’s credit if treated in earnest, caused him a feeling of satisfaction which he was generous enough not to conceal. The mission was a complete success, an early consummation of the marriage was agreed upon, and the ambassador on his return was loaded with presents.

EMPRESS OF JAPAN.

It may well be imagined that those whose duty called them to the court avoided, even in the lightest of humors engendered by the wine-cup, a subject fraught with so much danger. It was not a great hardship to do this where so much to pass the time pleasantly and agreeably offered itself. Amusements and festivities were not wanting, the province was well governed, the harvests for years had been good, the hand of the tax-collector lay lightly upon peasant and citizen alike; and a plentiful crop having again been garnered in the year of which we write, the usual harvest festival, with its attendant games and military exercises, was about to be celebrated on even a grander scale than usual.

SWORD DAGGERS.

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